


Where No Flowers Bloom

by xtricks



Series: Where No Flowers Bloom [1]
Category: Marvel (Comics), X-Men (Comicverse)
Genre: Alternate Universe, Gen, Mojoworld, Pre-Comics
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2005-04-12
Updated: 2012-02-05
Packaged: 2017-10-06 13:55:39
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 4
Words: 6,694
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/54391
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/xtricks/pseuds/xtricks
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Gaveedra7, long before the X-men.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. ?

**Prologue**

Born one of many, he was spilled from the warmth and shelter of the chamber to lie on the cold floor to cough and choke out the growth medium - _4-6 minutes of oxygen depravation results in varying degrees of brain damage_ \- at the feet of the medicos and the crèche workers - _four targets, no weapon, non-combatants_ \- until he was able to sit, shakily, on his own.

"That's a keeper."

Hands - splayed against the dark packed earth of the hatchery and still damp with blue birthing fluids. His hands. Hands hard on him - _three opponents, vulnerable at genitals, kneecaps, non-combatants_ \- pulling him forward as uncoordinated muscles struggled to put into action training imbedded in a newborn brain.

Laughter. "Look at him go!"

Pain - _flesh wound, right shoulder, heat damage_ \- and he screamed jerking against the cage of knees and thighs as the medico branded him. It was the first sound he made.

"Take it then. It's intact, good brain function. The Gaveedra line's always been a good one."  


* * *

  
**1**

Cycles of learning what he knew; how to walk and run, how to speak the rasping tongue of the Spineless Ones, how to fight - for that was his function - how to live. Learning too things he did not know; the small words and gestures of the crèche language, how to catch the attention of the trainers by being beautiful and wild and showy, how to winnow lies from truth, how to find the secret moments of quiet in the dorms where fifty others of his kind learned and fought and waited.

"Gaveedra," whispers in the dark. It was lights out, the trainers gone and the crèche wardens just past their rounds. It was the free time - stolen moments of pleasure or fear or hate. Killing had been done during lights out and other body things more promising. Gaveedra rolled over and sat up, drawing his blanket with him to hide the pallor of his skin.

"A?"

"Did you hear - did you hear?" It was Narrun12, crouched at the foot of his bed and out of sight of the doorway should a warden come along.

"What?" Gaveedra looked around to see many of the others also awake, eyes shone in the dimness and crèche-tongue whispers drifted like dreams in the dark. "I heard nothing."

"The winnowing," Narrun hissed. "It comes."

Gaveedra's mouth soured with fear. The winnowing.

"The trainers have not spoken," He gestured disbelief though no one could see. His fingers were shaking and he tucked them under his chin and chewed on his lip.

The winnowing was what they were all waiting for - their greatest hope and greatest fear all in one. The winnowing would free them from the crèche, from the hard hands and anonymous, dull routine of the training, eating, sleeping and waiting. For those who lived.

"They will not."

"But this -" Saliia4 and her clone Saliia5 whispered in unison and pulled at their pale hair which hung past their ears. Gaveedra touched his own hair - the color of copper wire, shining and straight. He'd never seen it before. It just now brushed his jawline, a touch that still made him flinch. It was new. Always before the crèche keepers came by and stripped the hair that grew on their heads - and was just beginning to dust some other places - away.

"It is different," He agreed, pressing a fingertip into his mouth to chew thoughtfully on it. The habit was comforting, if forbidden. Small disobediences were overlooked and too much obedience drew attention. "But sometimes things are different."

Sometimes the trainers changed things, sometimes they were kind when they had been cruel. Other times they gave punishment for no reason; Gaveedra was terrified of the trainers, they all were. Trainers and whitecoats held all their lives in their hands; over the years, the unfit and undesirable had been culled. He had watched as cadre-sibs were dragged away to be recycled on the careless word of a whitecoat or trainer. He had groveled more than once to keep from being culled himself. Their fear pleased the trainers and it made Gaveedra sick with a heat that he knew better than to reveal.

"So they can tell us apart," Narrun hissed. All the others fell silent for a moment, all of them feeling the same awe - near worship - and fear.

"The Spineless Ones ..." Gaveedra whispered, falling into the complex tongue of their masters. Their lords. The ones who gave them purpose - those who ruled their every moment, every hope, every dream. It was for them that Gaveedra struggled so hard - to be the best - to be the victor. To win. So did everyone else, all the world turned for them.

"Through the winnowing," Narrun whispered. "So they can tell us apart. It will be soon."

"When -" Gaveedra leaned off the side of his cot to grip Narrun's arm and shake her, feeling wild, dizzy with excitement. She knew things - she talked with the trainers when most of them avoided them. "When?"

She tried to jerk away, wincing, but Gaveedra was stronger. "I don't know. Soon."

"Soon," Gaveedra released her, licking his lips. "Soon."

Tomorrow would not be soon enough.

**TBC**


	2. Chapter 2

**2**

"All right you runts!" The bellow jerked Gaveedra's attention from his food. Around him the scrape of fingers on plastic bowls fell silent as the Overseer waddled down the center of the chow hall. Fingertips shifted minutely against the edges of tables and dishes as the cadre whispered among themselves in silence.

"You been learned." The Overseer turned to them, huge and heavy - nearly seven feet tall - bred for power and durability not grace. Bred to control, bred to train and bred to serve the Spineless Ones - as they all were. Small dark eyes scanned the tables and Gaveedra held his breath, hoping for invisibility. The Overseer cracked the punishment prod against his big thigh and the whole room flinched.

"You been ed-u-cated," The rumbling voice barked. "You as pretty as you gonna get. Clever as the whitcoats made you. Now you gonn strut you stuff, runts. It's time."

"-time - time -" Whispers now, the cadre too excited to keep obedient silence.

Gaveedra met Neruun's eyes, breathing fast. He wasn't hungry now - adrenaline already making his heart pound and his blood race. His gaze flicked around the room, measuring himself against the others. He knew, without pride, that he was among the best of the cadre - most of the others could not hold against his strength and reflexes. There were only a few worthy competitors; Karril17 had broken a hip yesterday, he would still be weak. Gaveedra's attention turned back to Neruun again, measuring this time. She was as fast as he was, nearly as strong. And, like him, she wanted to win.

Over the cycles, they'd learned each other's strengths and weaknesses. Sometimes Neruun won the sparring matches, sometimes he did. Sometimes they fought each other into exhaustion. Gaveedra's eyes narrowed, sharp with challenge, even as Nerrun's did. He would win. It mattered now and he would win.

"Up! Up! Up!"

They scrambled from the benches, food abandoned at the Overseer's call. The cadre was driven to the washing chambers and, under supervision, they cleaned themselves. As Gaveedra washed his new hair, he saw the Saliia's, wet and shaking approach one of the trainers. He pulled his glance sharply away, ashamed. Still he could not but glance back, hoping he was wrong but … the twins were seeking favors. Refuge. He could hear their whispered pleas over the sound of water. They were afraid. They always had been.

There was nothing wrong with them, they were strong, fast, pretty and graceful. They learned quickly, they were smart and they protected each other fiercely. Yet they rarely won the matches. They did not burn for victory, the way Neruun did, or he did. Gaveedra had faced them in matches, though he didn't like it, and he could always see the fear in them. They flinched away from his strikes, played too cautious, costing themselves victory. He couldn't stand to see it and he had tried to drive it from them but the fear had only gotten worse. Now - Gaveedra glanced up through his dripping hair - now he could see them leaning against the Overseer. They were trying to avoid the winnowing.

"Aya - runts! Quick now!" The Overseer, arms around the twins, hollered at everyone else to move. Saliia4 caught his gaze; blue eyes wide and frightened. Mouth thin, Gaveedra looked away and left them behind. They were not warriors, taking shelter under the Overseer's body, not anymore.

Wet and naked, Gaveedra hurried with the others down the packed earth hallways to the huge room where they usually did their practices. The room was enormous, able to hold all of them while they fought and practiced under the watchful gaze of the trainers in the catwalks above. Walls of blank, dull gray earth were braced by rusted steel, the ceiling soared into shadows where catwalks crossed and the whitecoats sometimes stood to observe them. The red eyes of cameras gleamed in the dimness, always watching. At one end, huge steel doors, pitted and scarred from accidental blows, had always stood locked. Gaveedra knew, they all did, that those doors led out of the crèche into - he didn't know what they led to and he had only prayed to the Spineless Ones that someday he would find out.

Today, those doors were open.

Noise poured in, harsh, rhythmic, deafening; Gaveedra could hear screams and smell blood. He and the others spread reflexively into the training room, each staking out a territory, wary in the sudden light and sound. Gaveedra kept a corner of his attention on Neruun12, knowing her as his greatest opponent. He could see her watching him too and bared his teeth in challenge. He was shaking, naked skin prickling with adrenaline and fear and hunger. He could taste the challenge ahead, hungered to answer it, to throw himself on it and win. Behind them, the doors to the crèche slammed shut and all of them jumped in unison. The Overseer was gone, the catwalks above empty. They had been given no instruction.

It was long minutes before Karril17 stalked forward, Gaveedra could see the unsteady balance from his injured hip, to peer beyond the open door. His dark skin was stark in the harsh light spilling from the unknown, he was naked and narrow and weaponless and dwarfed by the newness beyond. Karril had always been the first to become restless, sometimes earning punishment, sometimes reward, for his curiosity. Gaveedra had never been able to predict when curiosity was acceptable and so he stifled his own and let Karril or others take the risk. After a moment, Karril twisted his hand, calling them forward with a cadre sign of careful approach. They each took their turn, looking beyond the world they had known since hatching, then drawing away, shaken.

"What should we do?"

"Wait for instruction," Always the safest answer.

"How long?"

Gaveedra didn't know who spoke first, he only heard the questions echo around him in cadre whispers and in faces as bewildered as he was. He crept forward again and looked beyond the door, the noise hitting like a blow, the lights flashing and the scent of blood making him pant. There was death out there and the screams of wounded.

There was a great arena beyond their training room. A true arena, Gaveedra knew it in the flat, pure way he knew his own name, or the names of every joint in the human body - by implanted knowledge. Bright lights shone over glaring white sand - white except for the puddles and smears of blood and the crumpled shapes of bodies - high walls the color of bone gave way to hazy shadows that he strained to see clearly. The Spineless Ones were up there, they had to be and he longed to see them, his masters, his rulers, and his gods. The noise and vivid flash of lights defeated him and, shaking, Gaveedra turned his attention back to the arena proper. If he could not see the Spineless Ones, he would make them see him.

The arena was huge and bare and little more than a killing ground. Bright green lasers darted down from the audience high above, chasing after the figures fleeing across the sand, leaving screams or corpses in their wake.

"There are others," Kaliin hissed, crouched beside the door with a handful of white sand in his fist. "Like us, others."

Yes, there were others, naked like them, lanky and half-grown. Gaveedra squinted at features he had never seen before and others who were duplicates of faces he had known all his life. "Other cadres," Gaveedra muttered, glancing over at Neruun12 and away from her dead duplicate lying not too far away in the sand. There were other openings in the arena wall, pitch black against the harsh lights and every now and then a group or individual would dart out and make the run into the killing ground.

In the center of the arena was a great hole, an iron lip kept the sand from spilling away and dozens of chains dangled down into it. Those warriors who survived the dash across the sand leapt for the chains, scrambling down them in a mad race to escape the lasers. The lasers, Gaveedra noticed, were not terribly accurate but there were so many, as if every seat in the arena came with its own weapon. The sand was completely open and the hole in the center was vulnerable to every laser in the place. It was clear what was wanted, the cadre had been run through obstacle courses before; the goal was the hole and the chains and whatever lay below. The obstacle was the Audience itself.

"If we wait too long," Neruun's voice came from above him and Gaveedra twisted around to see her standing at his back. She gave him a sharp grin at his carelessness and he blushed - another time and he might have taken a killing wound for his foolishness, "there will be no other targets to distract the hunters."

She was right and Gaveedra stood, gaze flicking to his cadre, seeing the familiar rush of tension and eagerness. Lone individuals came under concentrated fire out there, those in a group could use each other as cover. Gaveedra swayed, back, forward, breathing hard and sweating already - trying to gage his own cadre for the moment, the right moment to run - he wanted another to go first, to draw fire and give him a better chance of survival. He knew that every one of his cadre thought the same thing, hoping for another to go first, scheming for another to die. He knew -

Gaveedra threw himself aside, grabbing the hands that had been aiming to shove him onto the sand. Twisting, he threw Yeaa2 out into the open where he screamed, leapt to his feet, ran two steps and died. Eager and fierce, Gaveedra fought with his cadre, snarling and shouting, as the weak were forced out. In a sudden burst, seeing a chance when four of his companions were thrown out at once, Gaveedra leapt out of the doorway and ran. Now, his heart thundered. Now was the time. Now was the chance. There were others on the sand, sprinting as he was, jinking and twisting across the killing ground in a dance of brilliant green lights and hot blood. Neruun, flashed a grin at him and leapt ahead, always faster. Dead bodies flashed by as Gaveedra sprinted for the hole, writhing wounded, sticky sand, dangerous footing, distracting lights that would kill him if he paused. The darting lasers grew thicker, the smell of death stronger, he danced back and forward, slagged sand cutting his bare feet. The hole was huge, he had no idea what waited within it - Gaveedra leapt onto the shallow lip and threw himself into the air, grunting, straining for one of the chains hanging from the unknown ceiling above.

Cold metal cut into his hands and Gaveedra screamed as a sudden burn skimmed across his hip - _flesh wound, heat damage_ \- his own flesh stinking under the brief touch of a laser, hands slipping at the agony. Blinded by tears, Gaveedra clung fiercely to the chain, slithering down it as blood slithered down his leg. He had to go, he was still vulnerable to the Audience. It wasn't over, he wasn't dead. He was - he could - still win. Groaning in pain, goaded by desperation, Gaveedra scrambled down into the darkness.

**TBC**


	3. Chapter 3

The adult arenas for Northwestern Canton channel Prime were always noisy; a haphazard collection of barred sleeping cells, dank washing rooms and cramped feeding chambers. The Northwestern arenas and cell 272v, blue section, had been his home since the winnowing and comforted him with familiarity. It had been uncounted battles since then, and growing taller, wider and more skilled. In a world without skies, where yellow sodium lights burned endlessly, Gaveedra didn't even have names — except in the abstract back of his pre-programmed mind — for day or night, month or year.

He had grown bitter too, vicious in the arena, desperate for attention. Northwestern Channel Prime was a great fall from his crèche fantasies of being a star of the arena, famous, personally owned by a Spineless One. He barely had fans, his personal ratings; shining ghostly blue above his cell were little higher than when he'd survived the winnowing. Sleepless, Gaveedra stared at the blue flicker of the ratings, numbers shifting beside the unwinking eye of the cell's vid-feed. The Audience endlessly surfed the channels, watching him sleep, eat, wash and — most importantly — fight. The hammock below creaked rhythmically as Yavvin26 and Err2 coupled, their displays flickered, creeping upward as the Audience watched. If sex ratings were stable, Gaveedra would have joined them, but he'd seen this before and by morning the ratings would drop again. Yavvin and Err were coupling for pleasure but it didn't seem worthwhile to waste anticipation and thought on sex when all energy should be turned to battle. Gaveedra, rubbing his fingertips delicately over the bruised ache where his collarbone was healing, watched the ratings until the shifting blue numbers followed him into sleep.

Feeding was always the same. Gaveedra grabbed one of the cleaner feeding bowls and elbowed his way to the slop line, sidestepping the subsonic snarls of Heche — singular survivor of its type — and a mystery even to Gaveedra's inborn knowledge. No one knew anything of Heche, what it was, who had bred it, even how to speak to it but everyone gave the towering creature wide berth. Even the Overseers feared it, using shock sticks to prod it into the arena for battle. Gaveedra had learned the hard way that those heavy, yellowed tusks Heche bared as it swaggered to the top of the line could crush a man's arm and his wrist ached with memory.

Food was the same, if higher protein that his crèche days, a tepid mash the color of old muscle. Sometimes bits of bone or strands of hair escaped the grinder — but Gaveedra always ate it all, nothing was wasted. Food was another motivation to victory, the most basic sort; eat or be eaten.

The server behind the bins of slop fumbled with the ladle, spattering Gaveedra's practice clothes. He bared his teeth at the cull and the scrawny creature cringed back, shielding a battered face with scarred, misshapen arms. "Food!" he snapped, banging the bowl against the edge of the counter, other warriors in the line growled, shoving at each other at the delay. The cull fished the ladle from the warm slop and hurriedly served him, arms shaking with terror. Gaveedra wrinkled his nose at the stink but moved on, he had no interest in wasting energy on a cull. Culls were rejects from the hatchery and as likely to end up in the pot as serving it. Gaveedra wondered for a brief moment if any of the food he was eating had once been someone that cull had known. The thought made him not hungry so he pushed it aside.

He scanned the feeding chamber for his group, finding that Err and Ticca2 and scaled Ssi18 had staked out a secure spot where they could crouch on the floor and eat with their backs to the soiled wall. Gaveedra joined them, jostling low status Ticca6 from a competing alliance and making her drop her ration. Ticca2 grinned at him and shuffled aside to make room, then leaned a scabbed, battered elbow on his shoulder. Gaveedra shrugged it off, watching for threats in the crowded feeding chamber as he shoved his food into his mouth with two fingers; Ticca2 wished to couple with him and he would not. She would tire of her pursuit, eventually, everyone did. He had a name, among the fighters — Coldheart — because he took no close allies and coupled with neither allies nor the helpless culls. Gaveedra had no heat, for ally or enemy, and loved only his ratings — so the whispers among the stable went.

Still, he understood enough of alliances to catch Yavvin's attention with a finger flick as his cellmate made his way through the slop line and make room so Err and Yavvin could sit skin to skin. Allies watched each other's backs and, in those times when rations or water or heat ran short, shared warmth and food. It was only the foolish and the weak who thought alliances lasted into the arena and Gaveedra didn't ally with fools. At least, he frowned and watched Yavvin and Err from the corner of his eye as they fed each other, he tried not to. He suspected that Yavvin and Err would be foolish, given the opportunity, and had no wish to be caught up in it.

Gaveedra's life was always the same; practice, feeding, sleeping and the arena. There was nothing else in the world and nothing else he could imagine doing. It was only the arena and the Audience that made the world alive; lights and heat, the burning joy of adrenaline, the bite of pain and the hunger for victory. Everything else was just waiting.

Gaveedra's group split after feeding; Err was to appear in the afternoon's fights, Ticca was scouting among the newcomers for promising young allies, Gaveedra had a practice session with the stable's trainers. Though there was no place of real safety in his life, Gaveedra was familiar with the passages of the stable and untroubled by his solitude as headed towards the practice rooms, picking at his sword calluses and hoping for a victory in his next scheduled battle.

Noises ahead made his heart suddenly race and he slunk forward to peer cautiously around the next corner. Gaveedra's lip curled in disgust and he straightened up from his stalking crouch. It was nothing.

Less than nothing.

One of the culls had been unwary and had been cornered by a couple of bored warriors. From the blood on the floor, it was half-dead already; Gaveedra could see little of it amid kicking legs and flailing fists. The warriors, as low ranked as he, were laughing and dancing breathlessly around the writhing cull. The smell of blood and sweat was hot in the dank hallways and Gaveedra was … tempted. He had no match today, only practice under the bored eyes of trainers who would waste no time on him. A fight would be good, adrenaline and risk and the hope of victory.

He could join the others, beat the cull, share in the laughter and the momentary alliance. Gaveedra found himself walking over there but the sight of the creature on the floor, all bones and bruises, changed his mind before he had any thought to put to it.

"What practice is this?" he asked, lip curled in well-practiced scorn. "Readying yourselves for a bout against cripples? No wonder we suffer in the ratings."

Vee5 and Saliia22 turned to glower at him. The blue of Saliia's eyes was distracting, stirring memories, and Gaveedra blinked them quickly away. "It's no concern of yours, Coldheart. Go away."

Gaveedra only gave them a glittering smile, rocking onto his toes, fists clenched. The blood smell was like the arena, the ritual of insults were the challenge. His eyes flicked to the dim red eye of a camera lens, even here the Audience watched and Gaveedra's breath quickened eagerly. He could earn ratings. He jerked his chin at the others, daring them to respond. Forgotten, the damaged cull struggled to drag itself away.

Vee bared her teeth. "Soon it'll be your blood drying on the floor -" and she leapt.

It was an old trick and Gaveedra had been watching her hips not her mouth. They crashed together with a meaty thunk before Gaveedra spun away, ducking under Saliia's sly strike. Vee was heavy, Saliia was fast and - Gaveedra discovered - the floor was slick with the cull's blood. His knees slammed into cracked concrete, a shadow loomed over him and he rolled, lashing out with a stiffened hand.

Saliia's wail made him shout triumphantly, transformed to a cough of pain when Vee's foot caught him in the ribs. The shock left Gaveedra gasping. He could barely roll onto his back, helpless and knowing it. But the expected blow didn't fall. He heard Vee snarling curses instead and Gaveedra stared in amazement as the cull threw itself at Vee again, sinking broken teeth into her calf in a fit of clumsy, snarling fury.

Gaveedra leapt back to his feet while Vee threw the cull into a wall with a howl. Then it was dodge and leap and Gaveedra hammered a fist into Saliia's nose and she fell back with an agonized cry and a rush of bright blood. Then it was Vee and her heavy fists and dangerous reach. They scuffled in the cramped hallway, panting, Gaveedra grinning at the heady rush of violence. This was good, this was right, this was victory. A moment's carelessness, a weakness in his opponent and Gaveedra lunged, driving an elbow into Vee's soft side. She folded with a grunt.

"Come on!" He yelled, dancing forward to give Vee a kick. "Come on!"

But they didn't. Measuring the worth of a back room brawl against needing her strength against assigned matches in the arena, Saliia had already fled. Vee rolled to her feet and backed warily away from him. Gaveedra watched them go, teeth bared but unwilling to call them back. It was a risk, taking them both on and a foolish one and he knew it now that the heat pounding in his ears was cooling down. A risk; his gaze fell to the bloody floor under his feet and then to the cull huddled against the wall, for no real reason. The cull noticed him looking and cringed.

The thing had attacked Vee, with no hope of victory still it had joined the battle as if Gaveedra were some ally. His lip curled, the cull was no ally of his and yet … it had a warrior's courage. "Why?"

The cull shook but lifted it's misshapen head to meet his eyes. They were like silver coins and Gaveedra's skin crept in recognition. "Knnow you," it slurred, teeth still red with Vee's blood. "We know you, Ga-vee-dra seven. We know you. Ga-vee-dra, we know…."

"Get away from me," he snarled, turning away to hide his face. Fear sickened him, bitter in his throat, fear like he'd not known since his days in the crèche. "Stay from me."

Those silver eyes in that mashed, deformed face, were a mirror to his own.

**TBC**


	4. Chapter 4

The Audience was chanting his name. _His_ name. Gaveedra leapt across the sand, twisting for the joy of it, hearing the crowd roar louder. For him. Yul43 was weakening, an older warrior, he'd spent his life in the Arena and Gaveedra knew that, today, Yul would die in it--under his sword.

Still, experience made Yul canny--and he had good weapons and armor from his years fighting--and while Gaveedra was playing the crowd, Yul rushed him with a double-eight swing of his fighting axe. Expensive steel screamed across Gaveedra's cheap weapon, skipping down over the inadequate guard to slice through Gaveedra's bare arm, shattering the bone. Screaming in shock, he retreated with Yul hammering at his shaky sheildwork, his sword abandoned in the sand. The Audience was screaming again--Yul's name. 

Gaveedra shook away the tears of pain, weakness rushing through him with each thump of his heart as it sent his blood in a pulsing arc --_ slashed artery_, his conditioning murmured -- across the absorbent sand. He didn't have long before blood loss cost him this victory and, quite possibly,his life. Crabbing across the sand, Gaveedra managed a moment to stuff his limp arm out of the way in his yellow belt and bent his flagging energy to battering Yul back with his shield.

The axe would shatter it too, if he didn't take care and Gaveedra was forced to play the cautious warrior instead of the showy one. With his vision beginning to gray, he stepped on a lost weapon, buried in the sand. Crouching down--Yul taking his own turn to egg the Audience into wilder cheers--Gaveedra let his head droop as he fought to twist his arm free of his shield straps. He couldn't kill Yul with a shield, he needed to get a real weapon.

When Yul circled back to give him the grace stroke, Gaveedra exploded from his crouch in a weaving rush. He had a broken spear head in his working hand. Yul's wide eyed face made Gaveedra shout weakly in triumph as he he shoved the spearpoint into Yul's throat. It was a clumsy blow and Gaveedra was sorry for that, as Yul slowly coughed out his life. There was red blood everywhere, sprayed in great arcs, in uncertain trials and pooling under Gaveedra's knees as the sand rose up to meet him. The sand reached up to cradle his cheek next and Gaveedra found himself lying next to Yul, their blood mixing together, sinking into the white sand. The Audience was shouting now, cheering, as both of them died.

He hadn't expected to wake again.

Gaveedra lurched upright with a yell, flailing wildly, ears buzzing and heart racing. _\--Drugged_\-- though he'd never felt it before. White lights and white coats surrounded him and he writhed, snapping at too close fingers only to have an overseer loom above him and club him soundly for his behavior. "Lie still!" It barked. Panting, Gaveedra subsided.

He could smell blood, his own, and feel a dull heat in his arm. The sensation stirred memory and he recalled watching Yul's struggle to breathe as cold crept along his fingers and toes. He recognized one of the concrete ante-chambers outside the Arena and could feel one of the steel treatment tables under his bare back as the whitecoats worked over him to save his life. It wasn't something Gaveedra had expected; he was of no value to the Northern Canton, just another nameless fighter. But the whitecoats did treat him and when they were done, he was hauled to his feet and led away by the overseers, shaking with aftershock.

They took him from the Arena and not back to the barracks. Instead, he was taken to an elevator, ones used to move overseers and whitecoats, never slaves. Crowded between the hulking overseers, Gaveedra picked at the white bandage on his arm, mouth dry with terror. They could be taking him to the slaughter house, his wound was severe enough to keep him from the Arena for a week or more and why would the Canton bother to feed him that long? Most likely he was to be killed. Gaveedra shut his eyes and hunched his shoulders, well trained obedience keeping him quiet and pliant as the elevator rattled to a halt and the overseers hauled back the rusted iron gate.

The world beyond was nothing like Gaveedra had ever seen. The walls soared up twice his height, and they were not packed earth, nor iron, nor the pale rough concrete of the Arena but smooth and white and shining -- bright as teeth. Even the floor was smooth and white and Gaveedra was afraid to set foot on it but the overseer's barked "Come!" moved him as it always did. He left gritty, bloody footprints behind.

The overseers looked as out of place as he did and more than that, they looked nervous, something Gaveedra had never imagined of the savage lords who had always ruled his world. He began to sweat for if what was ahead frightened the overseers ....

Strange green ... wires crept across the walls, twining with each other and bone white supports that were placed to hold globes of soft, colored lights. The air smelled different; there was no trace of sweat or blood, or old iron or filth but more than that -- a scent to the air like life but like no life --_growing plants_\-- Gaveedra had known before. The plants grew denser and the air sweeter, as well as warmer and wetter, as the overseers led him through a pattern of turns and doorways, under soft lights and strange colors.

They turned a corner and a sudden draft brought a thick, oddly meaty oder to Gaveedra's nose. It hit him in some primitive place, a corner of his mind where the conditioning lay heavy over instincts. His stomach twisted in ... fear, no --_awe_ \-- as Gaveedra looked up to see, sprawled over a raised platform, one of _them_. The Spineless Ones. Gaveedra fell to his knees with a faint moan.

Sweat beaded suddenly on his forehead, fear -- no it was _worship_ he felt -- as the overseers knelt beside him. Gaveedra swallowed, gagging, terrified that he'd disgrace himself in front of the lords of the world. He had never imagined, in all his dreams of glory, that he'd ever see one of the Spineless Ones himself. It was a privilege, never mind the strange panic sweat on his palms or the way his heart raced as if in primitive terror. The Masters were not to be feared, but to be _worshiped,_ to be _served_, to be _pleased_. He knew this, instantly, inevitably, the way he'd know his own name when he'd opened his eyes for the first time in his life. Gaveedra stole another, wide-eyed glance up at the swollen form looming at one end of the room.

The Spineless One was huge, rolls of gray flesh coiled across a padded platform three times the size of Gaveedra's cot. It shone with moisture, skin so thin that Gaveedra could see the faint trace of greenish veins beneath the surface. One end tapered to a twitching tail as thick as Gaveedra's torso. The other -- piled high atop coils of it's own body -- branched into multitudes of twining, clever, tendrils surrounding a wide flat head end where a trio flat black eyes were sunk deep into rolls of flesh. A puckered opening flexed wide, revealing three huge serrated teeth that interlocked together. A shrill piping broke out, so high it made Gaveedra's ears ache, as the Spineless One spoke in the pure language.

"This is it?"

One of the crouching overseers rumbled an affirmative to the floor, rocking back and forth in anxiety. The Spineless One turned it's attention to Gaveedra and he abased himself, pressing his forehead to the floor, dizzy with shock and awe and some hidden, inexplicable terror. All he could thing was to -- _bow down_ \-- in the face of the glorious Master and await whatever fate it chose to bless him with. 

"Approach!" It squealed and Gaveedra scrambled on hands and knees to obey. He didn't dare rise.

There was more than one Spineless One on the platform, or so Gaveedra thought. There were two massive clusters of tendrils, snuggled close together, six eyes and two mouthes puckered tight. Some of the coils had a greenish tinge while others seemed more pallid. As he approached, the tendrils reached out, twining indiscriminately around hands and legs, around his neck and torso, across his face and through his loose, long hair and dragged him close. Gaveedra whimpered, eyes wide and glazed above a thick moist band that had covered his mouth, and went limp.

His conditioning, which was always full of information -- potential weaknesses in opponents, a litany of names or lists of injuries -- was silent except for the insistent urge to abase himself, to obey, and flooding him with submissive awe so strong that he was afraid he was going to lose control of his bladder. Kneeling, half sprawled on top of sticky gray coils -- it was the Spineless Ones who were the source of the meaty stink, his nose told him -- Gaveedra remained pliant as the Master's fondled him like he was a doll.

They shrilled to each other as they touched him. Gaveedra felt tendrils dabbling in the drying blood on his skin and pulling at his hair. They picked off his bandage and prodded at his wounded, aching arm, until fresh blood flowed. Faint and half smothered, Gaveedra stared up at the Masters, astonished, amazed, and ... revolted as he was privileged with the actual _touch_ of the Spineless Ones. He had never imagined such a thing.

"It nearly died!" One said to the other.

"Yes, and lives still. Nearly is not _completely._"

"It was chance."

"There is no chance!"

"You have wasted _ratings!_"

"It is pretty!"

They were talking about him, Gaveedra realized dully. Somehow, he had drawn the attention of the Masters! This was his dream, to be privileged by their attention and all he longed for now was his cot and a chance to rest. They stank; the thought made him flinch at the blasphemy. But they did. 

Face pressed to cold, damp flesh, Gaveedra stared blankly across the platform until, with a start, he realized he was looking at another slave. She had been half hidden behind the Masters, silent and motionless. It was only now that Gaveedra could see her and more than that, _recognize_ her. It was one of the Saliias, Gaveedra didn't know which one and she was so _different,_ that he was not even positive he was right. Gaveedra knew the curves of female fighters that came with time, just as his own body had thickened and changed, females grew rounder but still, all slaves were strong, powerful, dense with muscle, some heavily scarred. The Saliia who huddled amid the Master's flesh was none of this. She seemed to have tried to imitate the Spineless Ones herself. Her flesh had ballooned out, a wide expanse of pink skin, tiny hands at the ends of lumbering limbs a face broad and round with two frightened blue eyes staring at him. She mouthed his name, eyes as wide with amazement as his own. Gold and silver jewels wound around her massive limbs and obese belly, gems had been set into her ears, her nose, even her lips. Gaveedra could only stare in shock, he had assumed the Saliias were long dead.

"It's my ratings to spend. It's an investment."

"You're foolish, Mjo, foolish."

"It did not die when it should. It may have a performance or two left."

One of the Spineless Ones pushed him away and upright and Gaveedra staggered back, blood dripping from his fingertips to puddle on the platform. One of the Masters reached down to draw idle patterns in it. "It is mine," it said, waving red tipped tendrils. "And I shall keep it."

"You are mine, beast," the Spineless One said to Gaveedra, black eyes shining dully in the pastel light.

"Yes," he stammered in the lisping language of the Masters, fresh shock rippling through him as Gaveedra realized he was _owned_. "Oh, my Master. I am yours."

"Go."

Gaveedra stumbled back from the platform, head bowed, hardly daring to breathe. But he could not resist, at the entrance to the Master's room, a glance back. Saliia was hidden again, behind the bulk of the Spineless Ones.

**Author's Note:**

> This is set on 'Mojoworld' and is AU. It's also one of my old stories.


End file.
